


And the only solution was to stand and fight...

by JoyfullyyoursDav



Series: Never Let Me Go (Twins' Mom AU series) [3]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Canon Related, Child Abandonment, Dysfunctional Family, Gen, Light Angst, Long Lost/Secret Relatives, Motherhood, Original Character(s), Post-Canon, Regret, Twins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 20:06:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13982379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyfullyyoursDav/pseuds/JoyfullyyoursDav
Summary: Taako and Lup got their fire from somewhere, after all. And right now, their mother isn’t taking no for an answer.Six years after the Hunger was defeated and twenty years after the Starblaster crew was lost, the IPRE finally starts talking.





	And the only solution was to stand and fight...

**Author's Note:**

> Part 3 of the twins' mom series! Hope you dig it.
> 
> The ways which bureaucracy, legend, mysticism, love and religion would interact with Leema as she looks for the twins is something I'm super into exploring.
> 
> Maybe I named the President of the IPRE after a politician I don't like, and maybe I didn't.....oh, and the title is from "Only if For A Night" by Florence and the Machines. (If you want some Taaco Twin mom feels, I really recommend the Ceremonials album.)

Six years after the Awakening, and one year after Leema began searching for the twins, the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration released a statement. Leema almost tore her copy of the Two-Suns Tribune in her haste to read it.

> In the years since the Darkness was lifted, we at the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration have been inundated with messages, letters and visitors. And we, along with so many others, have heard the amazing tales about the heroes known as the Seven Birds. We would fail as a scientific institute if we simply accepted these rumors without due diligence. Ever since the Awakening, we have been working nonstop to rebuild our organization and validate or discredit the stories we’ve heard. We plan to share verified information as we are able to.
> 
> We know, for certain, the following. Over twenty years ago, seven IPRE employees were selected to explore the reaches of the known universe, in study of something we named the light of creation. The crew boarded a ship called the Starblaster, and within moments of take-off, the Darkness descended on our world. We have not heard from these explorers since, and to date, we haven’t been able to verify their wellbeing or whereabouts. We’re also unable to conclusively state what they may have experienced on their journey.
> 
> After careful consideration, we have decided to release the names of the individuals that embarked on that mission. Their names have already been made publicly available via a press release conducted the day before take-off, but of course the number of people it reached was limited. Our official records list the crew identities and roles as follows:
> 
> Davenport, captain/pilot. Barry Bluejeans, senior research scientist. Merle Highchurch, head physician/biologist. Taako and Lup, arcanists/chefs. Lucretia, chronicler. Magnus Burnsides, security officer.
> 
> We are still hard at work to locate these individuals and verify the nature of their adventures. It is a daunting task, and we appreciate the public’s understanding and patience.
> 
> In the light of creation,  
>  Dietrich Ravenstahl  
>  IPRE President

Leema read the statement twice, then a third time. She read the sentence, “Taako and Lup, arcanists/chefs,” over and over. She ran her fingers across their names as if she could somehow reach them through the paper. She then turned her attention to the signature. Dietrich Ravenstahl. If she was going to get more details about the IPRE and the voyage that took the Birds off this planet, this was the person she had to talk to.

 

“Mr. Ravenstahl?” Leema called. The well-dressed man who had been crossing the street toward her suddenly jerked his head and turned on the spot. He hurried away in the opposite direction, shoulders hunched. “No, wait, please!” Leema cried, jogging to catch up to him. Out of nowhere, a large half-orc man appeared in front of her, extending an arm in her path to stop her.

“Sorry,” the orc grumbled. “Move along now.” A bodyguard. Of course.

“Ravenstahl!” Leema shouted. “Please! I just need a minute of your time!”

“Leave a message with my receptionist!” Ravenstahl answered, and he was nearly around the corner now, and gods knew how long it would take her to track him down again—it had already taken two months—

“Taako and Lup are my children!” Leema screamed. “I’m the mother of the twins of fire and stone, and I have a right to know what happened to them!”

Ravenstahl stopped, hesitating and glancing around him. Most people on the street had stopped going about their business to watch this scene. Ravenstahl sighed, his shoulders visibly slumping in his dark suit. Very quickly, he walked toward Leema, not getting too close. The orc didn’t lower his arm, as if Leema might attack at any moment.

“The arcanists aboard that ship had no living relatives,” Ravenstahl said to her quietly, coldly. “They didn’t even have a surname.”

“And that’s a mistake I have to live with,” Leema shot back. “I was a terrible parent and I don’t deserve much, Mr. Ravenstahl. But I deserve to know what happened to them. You must have samples of their blood on file. Give me a DNA test if you don’t believe me. I’m their mother, and if you won’t talk to me, I’ll go to every reporter on the planet. I’ll tell everyone how poorly the Institute is treating the mother of two of the heroes. That won’t look good for you, will it?”

Ravenstahl’s face twisted into a forced smile. “Set up an appointment with my receptionist,” Ravenstahl said through gritted teeth, his mustache twitching above his lips.

“I’ve tried talking to your receptionist,” Leema snarled. “She wouldn’t say a word to me past ‘hello.’”

“I’ll tell her to schedule you in,” Ravenstahl said, louder now, teeth still clenched. “But…we can’t do this here. We’ll do this…later.” And he turned around again, hurrying away with his fists clenched at his sides.

 

“Ah,” Ravenstahl said when he opened his office door to see Leema standing in the hall. “Hello again.” He gestured her inside. Like the rest of the Institute, his office was ornately decorated, filled with furniture of polished cherry wood, portraits of important-looking people hanging on the walls. Leema sat in the chair he gestured to, opposite a large desk. Ravenstahl walked around the desk, opened a drawer and pulled out a case of cigars, holding it open toward Leema.

“No thank you,” she said, and waited while he chose one for himself, lit it, and sat down behind the desk.

“I hope you understand,” Ravenstahl began, “why we might be suspicious of someone coming forward, claiming to be a relation. Especially when the arcanists in question—”

“Taako and Lup,” Leema said.

“Yes. Taako and Lup. Especially since they went on record more than once saying they had no living relatives. And as I said, they didn’t have a surname, which means—”

“I know what it means,” Leema said coolly.

Ravenstahl cleared his throat, looking supremely uncomfortable. “Yes. So I’m sorry to ask…”

“You want to do a DNA test.”

Ravenstahl cleared his throat again. “Yes.”

“Fine.” Leema pushed up one sleeve, then the other. “Right now? Where do I go?”

His eyes widened a little, as if he was surprised that she was actually consenting. “You really believe that Taako and Lup are your children,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

“I know they are,” Leema said.

“When was the last time you saw them?”

“They were five or six years old. A long, long time ago.”

Ravenstahl picked up a folder on his desk and flipped it open, looking at its contents. “The names you provided—Teru and Lemb? They don’t match anything we have on record,” he said.

“No, they wouldn’t. Elves get named twice. The second names are the ones that are official. That stick.”

“Yes, of course. But we haven’t been able to find record of Teru and Lemb anywhere, on any record.”

“I learned recently that they started going by Taako and Lup at a very young age,” Leema explained. “By age eleven, in fact, but perhaps even younger than that. They never received formal schooling as children, and they weren’t ever wards of the state. So there wouldn’t be many records with their original names.” Leema handed Ravenstahl the scroll of parchment she’d obtained from the New Elfington clinic. “They stayed with friends and family, including my sister for a few years. She took them to the doctor, which is where I got this.”

Ravenstahl took the scroll and glanced at it. “And where’s the evidence that Teru and Lemb are, in fact, Taako and Lup?”

“My blood,” Leema replied. “Are you going to do the DNA test or not?”

Ravenstahl sighed, setting everything down on the desk and tapping his cigar on an ashtray. “I’ll be honest with you, madam. You aren’t the first person to come forward claiming to be related to some of the Starblaster crew. You aren’t even the first person to claim to be Taako and Lup’s parent.”

“ _What?_ ” Leema hadn’t expected this. “Who else?”

“That’s not…important,” Ravenstahl said, shaking his head. “My point is that—”

“No, it’s actually _very_ important,” Leema interrupted. “Because they do have a father, you know.”

Ravenstahl cleared his throat. “Regardless,” he said, “the person in question refused to take a DNA test, so I believe he wasn’t being entirely honest—”

“What was his name?” Leema interrupted.

He hesitated. “I don’t think I should say,” he answered.

“Just the first name,” Leema prodded.

Ravenstahl paused for a moment, and then said with a sigh, “Tannith.”

Leema felt the blood drain out of her face. Her mouth dropped open. She had never considered that _he_ would be searching too. She had hardly given him any thought at all during this process. The search had felt distinctly personal, belonging to her and the two babies she left. And now, to find _him_ on the same path…

At the look on her face, Ravenstahl sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment, exasperated. “My point is that even if you are related, we can’t offer you a stipend for missing crew members, since we don’t know if they’re actually deceased or—”

“A stipend?” Leema interrupted, furious. “Who said I wanted money?”

“Don’t you?” Ravenstahl asked quietly.

“ _No!_ I want information. Gods, you think I’m here for _money_?”

“Others have been,” he replied shortly. He cleared his throat again and said, “Anyway. The fact remains that we don’t know what happened to the crew. We don’t know any more than we’ve already released to the public.”

“Forgive me if I have doubts.” Leema crossed her arms. “Your institution knows more about intergalactic travel and exploration than any other. And you’re telling me you haven’t even confirmed if the crew is alive? If the legends are even possible?”

“Some of them are theoretically possible, yes,” Ravenstahl told her. “But it’s not enough to declare them _possible_. People want to know if they’re real. _We_ want to know if they’re real. And without proof—”

“What is the light of creation?” Leema asked.

“Madam, with all due respect—”

Leema laughed. “That’s a funny word. _Respect_. Your organization hasn’t done anything but disrespect me, and the crew of souls that it lost, and the other family members of that crew. It took you six years to make a statement about this whole mess. Don’t claim to have respect, Mr. Ravenstahl.”

He stared at her for a few moments, then continued talking as if she hadn’t said anything. “We’ve released all that we’re able to regarding the light of creation. There are many published papers and treatises on the subject. Anything more than that and—well. I can’t see how unproven theories are relevant to what happened to your children.”

Leema changed the subject, because this seemed like a battle that wasn’t worth fighting just yet. “I want to know more about Taako and Lup and the work they were doing here,” she said.

“First, understand that I never met them,” Ravenstahl said. “I wasn’t President twenty years ago. Only a small number of the original staff has remained, in fact. But yes, as stated, Lup and Taako were arcanists. Their job aboard the ship was to handle the arcane side of business. They were experts in the schools of evocation and transmutation magic, and possessed skills that were indispensable out in the field.”

“The newspaper said they were arcanists and…chefs?” Leema asked, and to her surprise, Ravenstahl chuckled.

“Yes. Apparently, they refused to go on the mission unless their official title was ‘Wizard Chef.’ So that’s _technically_ what our records state.” Ravenstahl took a long drag from his cigar. “I suppose it was a small thing to concede, in the grand scheme of things.”

“So they must have been pretty powerful, if the Institute wanted them on this mission so badly,” Leema said.

“Oh, goodness yes. Best arcanists we’ve ever had, and we’ve produced some of the most competent magic users this world has ever seen.” Ravenstahl took a drag on his cigar. “Again, I never met them. But I’ve heard…stories.” He chuckled again.

“What kind of stories?” Leema asked, and she couldn’t keep the hint of desperation out of her voice.

“Listen,” Ravenstahl said, suddenly sounding very serious. “You need to understand that I don’t know you. I don’t know what your motivations are, and I don’t know what you plan to do with the information I give you. You say that if I don’t tell you everything, you’ll go to the press. Well, maybe you will and maybe you won’t. But if you do, maybe the public will tear _you_ apart, for abandoning the children that turned out to be two of the most famous heroes of our age.”

Leema’s eyes narrowed. “Are you threatening me?”

“No. I’m merely pointing out a fallacy in your logic. And I’m letting you know that I can’t just hand over everything you want to know, no questions asked.”

“You seem to be asking a _lot_ of questions, actually,” Leema said, standing up. “But that’s fine, Mr. Ravenstahl. I’ll take my chances with the public. They can’t tell me anything I haven’t already told myself. I don’t care about public condemnation. I want to know what happened to the twins. That’s all I care about.” She turned towards the door.

“Wait a minute.” When she looked back at him, Ravenstahl was resting his head in his hand, the cigar smoking in the ash tray. He sighed heavily and stood up. “I’ll give you more information,” he said. “There’s a ledger, a journal that the chronicler of the crew kept.”

“Lucretia,” Leema said.

“Yes. She kept a record as they were training and getting to know one another. I’ll give that to you, but we need some assurances first.” Ravenstahl gestured back to Leema’s chair, and she sat. “First, yes, we absolutely need that blood test. That’s insurance, you understand. Second, we’ll need to be certain of your mental competency.”

Leema raised her eyebrows. “What does that mean?” she asked.

“We need to know that you’re of sound mind,” Ravenstahl explained. “That will help us ascertain whether you can be trusted with information that’s, quite honestly, top secret. So you’ll need to meet a few times with our psychologist on staff.”

“Anything else?” she asked dryly.

“Yes. You’ll need to sign non-disclosure agreements stating that you won’t share any of the information we give you. If you do all of these things and submit to a few more interviews, I’ll hand that journal—and any other documents I’m able to share—over to you.”

They were silent for a few moments as Leema studied his smooth face, his neatly manicured mustache. She felt hatred—actual, whitehot hatred—coursing through her veins. “You lost them,” she said, her voice icy. “You lost them, and you’re going to make me jump through hoops before you’ll tell me anything.”

“We didn’t _lose_ them,” Ravenstahl insisted. “What happened to the Starblaster and its crew couldn’t have been prevented.”

“You don’t _know_ what happened,” Leema said. “So how do you know if it could have been prevented?”

Ravenstahl sighed. “Either take the offer or leave it,” he said. “It’s the best I can do.”

Leema stood up again. “Fine. I’ll do whatever you want, as long as I get what I’m looking for.”

Ravenstahl smiled at this. “I’m sure you’ll find that the IPRE can be very accommodating.” He reached across the desk to shake her hand and she complied. “We’ll need some time, of course,” he said, “to draft the necessary legal documents and get all of our ducks in a row. We’ll be in touch to set up interviews and get the blood test done.”

Leema pulled her shawl more tightly around her. “Thank you.”

“There now,” Ravenstahl said, leading her to his office door with a hand on her shoulder. “That’s more like it!”

And Leema, who had never cast a spell in her life, imagined lobbing a magical fireball into this man’s smug face. The image was crystal clear and startling in its violence. Where had _that_ come from? she wondered as she made her way out of the colossal institute and back onto the windy street.


End file.
